Re: [ox-en] Translation complete: GNU/Linux - Milestone on the Way to the GPL Society
- From: Stefan Merten <smerten oekonux.de>
- Date: Mon, 10 Oct 2005 19:06:52 +0200
Hi Tom and all!
Last week (8 days ago) Tom Chance wrote:
On Sunday 02 Oct 2005 11:56, Stefan Merten wrote:
9 months (293 days) ago Tom Chance wrote:
I couldn't see where to make general comments on that page, so here are
some thoughts I had whilst reading it.
1) GNU/Linux has exchange value, and that is significant. You dismiss the
fact that companies have based profit models on Free Software as being
temporary, something that will disintegrate when all software is released
under the GPL (what about other licenses?). Of course for hackers, the
exchange value is irrelevant - or rather, invisible - to the account of
their mode of production. They are working outside of the capitalist
paradigm, unalienated.
But is it not significant that a product and a mode of production that is
unalienated, that isn't created fetishistic commodities, can also have an
exchange value? GNU/Linux is embedded in a capitalist paradigm and is, at
the same time, challenging it and making it irrelevant.
Well, if you take the formulation from the blotter "Free software is
as worthless as the air to breathe" then things probably get clearer.
Literally everyone bases its operation on "air to breathe". Workers
simply breathe it and where you use compressed air in industry the air
to be compressed is taken from the air to breathe. In no instance the
simple, plain air to breathe has an exchange value. But in each
instance exchange value is generated based on it's existence.
I think there is a fundamental difference here and this should not be
confused.
I don't understand what you mean here.
Yeah, I was a bit unclear.
Just to clarify, re-reading what I
wrote, I'm not endorsing exchange value but rather pointing out the
quasi-reformist potential of a mode of production that both satisfies some of
our requirements, and can fit in the capitalist system.
Well, I still think that Free Software in most of it's incarnations
has no exchange value. (I'm starting consider that it has until the
point it is published but I'm not sure about this yet.) I understood
that you say the opposite: That Free Software has exchange value and
this is shown by the fact that "companies have based profit models on
Free Software". May be I got you wrong here.
What I tried to point out was that production of exchange values /
profit models can easiyl rely on things which do not have exchange
value. Thus it is no contradiction to the non-exchange-value feature
of Free Software that companies base their profit on it. If not yet
clear I think an example could help.
However, I agree to you that it is somewhat funny that a new form
which has potential to overcome some older form is useful for this
older form. This is exactly what is described by the germ form theory
which describes this type of embeddedness as a precondition for a germ
form. This is, however, hard to swallow if you always thought of
autonomy as a precondition for a germ form. I think the contrary is
true - also because a system can only be changed from within.
2) Why have you not accounted for paid work on GNU/Linux?
At the time the paper was written this was not such a big issue than
it is now. While I'm at it I'd like to emphasize that much of the
basic work necessary for the success of Free Software has been done in
the Double Free mode. Only when Free Software became to be successful
Simple Free modes began to grow in number.
Really? As far as I'm aware people have been employed and writing a lot of the
core free software code for over a decade now, and certainly a significant
proportion for years. But more on this in a moment...
Well, what we really need here are good studies. Back in 2000 Alan Cox
replied to my respective question that the share of contributors who
shall contribute to the kernel as employees of such company raised
significantly during the then recent years. To me this meant that the
success of Free Software attracted companies.
The best study I know of in this regard is the FLOSS study made some
years ago [http://www.infonomics.nl/FLOSS/report/]. From "Deliverable
D18: FINAL REPORT -- Part IV: Survey of Developers"
4.2 Motivations for developing Open Source / Free Software
[...]
All the other motives that were offered to the respondents reached
only shares below 10% and will be neglected here. However, we have
to except the motive to make money from this rule, because this
items gains a lot of importance as a reason to continue with OS/FS,
growing from 4% to 12%.
Sometimes I have the impression that the representation of the paid
people id far too high in people's minds.
I'm not sure why you think that hackers who are paid to hack are still
alienated (and presumably also exploited?) I know several people who are in
this position and they enjoy almost complete creative freedom, they work in a
community of hackers, they don't lose control of their products, they don't
produce for exchange value alone (or even primarily). I think the danger of
your single and double freedom model is that it makes a false distinction
around exchange value, when in fact the reality is more complex.
I completely agree with you and under different circumstances I
emphasize that even in proprietary production aspects of non-alienated
work became more important during the last years. Nonetheless there is
a hard limit marked by the need to produce exchange value. All the
room for creativity vanishes if this is not ensured.
Therefore I think the terms Double and Simple Free Software are useful
in that they make clear some poles. Reality is often mixed in
complicated ways.
The whole section makes a good manifesto for the future, but you frame it as a
description of what GNU/Linux is today (or was at the time of writing). As
such it carries no force since it is just fanciful, like those on the left
who claim Cuba is a socialist paradise, or those who say liberal democracy in
Iraq is imminent. As it stands the paper has some interesting ideas but is so
inaccurate that it really doesn't have much merit, in my opinion.
Well, that is what this whole project is for ;-) .
You could make a much stronger case for getting towards that ideal future if
you clearly set it out as a manifesto and described where reality today
differs from that ideal, just as you have done for example with your
single-double model. You could then try to suggest how we might get from
where we stand today to the ideal, or at least propose that as an area for
further research. For example, in my dissertation on the Hacker Ethic and
meaningful work I concede that increasing numbers of people are paid to work
on the various components of GNU/Linux, analysed how their mode of production
affects various Marxist concerns in production (exploitation, immiseration,
alienation, etc.), briefly brought in the fact of employment, and then
suggested that it was a distinct improvement. More work on how payment fits
into the hacker mode of employment is one interesting research area...
I already set your dissertation on my need-to-read list but my time
and energy is somewhat limited.
Mit Freien Grüßen
Stefan
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